(Disclosure: I am tired of writing about this topic over and over again, and I suspect that regular readers of this blog are tired of reading about it over and over again – here and here and here and here and…. Yet one keeps getting provoked by media obliviousness. It’s dirty work, but someone has to…..)
The trope that Americans have gotten more isolated and lonely over the last generation or so is irresistible to pundits and editors, no matter what academics say (and there are always one or two of us to provide journalists some cover). The latest, loudest declamation was by David Brooks in The New York Times of April 16, 2018, about the “epidemic of loneliness”–consistent with his recent psychologizing of what ails America. Yes, loneliness is a social problem, but no, there is no “epidemic of loneliness.” (If it’s epidemics of loneliness you want, check out the reports on farm women a century ago [1].)
Fortunately, others have responded to the latest wave. Notably, sociologist David Weakliem tracked down the one data link behind Brooks’s claim that loneliness rates doubled between the 1980s and 2000 and found that “the report of that survey didn’t say anything about changes in loneliness.” (Of course, the Times rarely publishes letters pointing out their mistakes.)
Below, I add a bit more to the fact base.
A Bit More Data
Although I think that the data are overwhelming against the epidemic claim, let’s indulge with some more.
First, distinctions are needed. At least three different topics get conflated in the media these days: feeling lonely, being socially isolated, and using new social media. They are not the same things. It is well known in the research, for example, that socially isolated people are likelier to report feeling lonely than others do–but not much likelier.[2] So, this post just addresses feelings of loneliness; other posts have addressed isolation and others the effects of the internet.
Weakliem found some long-term National Opinion Research Center data: a question asking survey respondents if they had felt “very lonely or remote from other people” in the past few weeks. In the 1960s, about 27 percent said yes; in 2001, about 25 percent did. Nothing there.
I reported similar fragments of data about loneliness in my book, Still Connected (perhaps I included the NORC data; I don’t recall offhand), with the same conclusion: No sign of a trend.
But, wait! There’s more! A 2015 study found that in college samples and more importantly, among high school students in the several decades-long Monitoring the Future project, there was a slight decline in reports of loneliness from the 1980s to 2010. Flat would be a close enough summary.
Who Cares?
A layperson might ask, What difference–besides dissing social scientists–does it make if these interesting articles about loneliness growing are off a bit? First, they are off a lot. But more important, they are a critical distraction. Chatter about feelings (of mainly affluent folks) distracts us from the many real crises of our time–say, widening inequality, children growing up in criminally and chemically dangerous neighborhoods, the dissolution of job security for middle Americans, drug addiction, housing shortages (where the jobs are), a medical system mess, hyper-partisanship, and so on. That’s what makes the loneliness scare not just annoying but also another drag on serious problem-solving.
…………….
Notes
[1] For example: U.S. Senate, 1909, Report of the Country Life Commission 60th Cong., 2nd sess., Senate Document 705. Washington DC: U.S.G.P.O.; Florence E. Ward, 1920, “The Farm Woman’s Problem.” Department of Agriculture, Circular 148. Washington DC: U.S.G.P.O.
[2] In my own recent research, for example, 27% of respondents in the lowest quintile of social network size were likely to be in the highest quintile of feeling lonely (3+ days a week), but 22% of those in the rest of the sample also reported feeling lonely three or more days a week. See also this paper by Child and Lawton.
MADE IN AMERICA 